Before the sun rises and well before his shift begins, Aman arrives at the hospital to make sure everything is in order for his team.

In a tightly packed room of some 25-30 custodial cleaning carts, he slides in between them, moving one over, one back, one forward, not unlike the puzzling of a Rubik’s cube. 

Once he has found his team’s carts, he lines them up like yellow taxi cabs and begins to prepare each one exactly how his team members prefer. Blue cloths for surfaces. Orange cloths for bathrooms. He refills cleanser containers for heavy duty cleaning, bathrooms, floors. Bleach for high-touch areas. As his crew arrives, some bleary-eyed, some rushing, Aman greets them by name, with a cart and a smile: “Good morning.” “I’m glad you are here today.” “It’s good to see you.”   

Aman navigates each day through a lens of deep gratitude, forged by the scarcity and violence of his youth. Growing up in deep poverty in Ethiopia, he fled the violence in his home country as a teenager and then spent 18 years in a Kenyan refugee camp. “It was a hard place to have hope,” he says. “Now, I wake up each day and I want to be here; I am happy and safe here.”

On busy days, he and his team members clean about 14 rooms each, stripping linens, clearing out trash, dusting, sweeping, disinfecting surfaces, cords, and equipment, making beds, cleaning bathrooms, mopping floors. In that exact order. Operating rooms and rooms in Labor & Delivery need deeper cleaning. Isolation rooms are further disinfected with a UV robot. 

He takes pride in his team and his work. “It is good for your mind when you see a clean environment,” Aman says. “It is reassuring and comforting, and this is good for the patients.” Occasionally, patients leave words of thanks on the room’s whiteboard. “This makes me happy; it makes me want to do more.” 

An app on Aman’s phone lets him know when rooms are completed, if a sudden mess needs attention, or to prioritize a room because a patient is waiting. Some requests are out of the ordinary, like when Aman was called to catch a disoriented bird in the hospital with a large net. “You need to be careful,” Aman explains with soft concern, “so you don’t hurt the bird.” 

It’s on the same phone each day that he calls his 7-year-old daughter Hawan, which means “wish” in his mother tongue, Feedhii. 

Aman and his wife had only recently gotten married and found out they were expecting when he learned he could go to America, where he’s now a citizen. He left with the hope they could follow. He still hopes they can. Hawan is curious, tenacious, and head over heels about gymnastics. She’s his everything, Aman says. He hasn’t held her since she was 27 days old.

As Aman navigates the hospital, pitching in on cleaning rooms, checking on quality, and stocking supply closets, he waves to the nurses in OB and fist-bumps co-workers. “He brings playfulness and humor with him and keeps work filled with happiness,” says Maria Romero, who has worked with Aman for six years and watched his daughter grow up through the pictures he shares with her. 

“If there is something that needs to be done, he jumps in and helps,” adds Christy Herrera, who says Aman's ability to listen and show respect makes him a good lead for his team. “He is quick to lighten my load if we are under a lot of pressure.”

“Everywhere I am, in Utah, in this hospital, there is kindness,” Aman says. People greet him with a smile here, turn toward him, ask how he’s doing. He bashfully admits he’s trying to learn Spanish to better engage with people at the hospital, alongside the five languages he already speaks.

As he walks down a wide empty hallway, cast in early morning rays. Aman spreads out his arms with pride, “I see that I am in paradise because of all the kindness here.”

Aman works another cleaning job after hours. But on the weekends, he takes long drives—often to Idaho, where he buys lottery tickets—bringing Hawan along for the ride atop his dash. His happiness coexists with heartache. This is where he shows her the Wasatch Mountains, fresh fallen snow, the leaves changing. 

Again and again, she says, “When I am coming, I’ll play in the snow with you. When I am coming, I’ll go to the mountains with you.”

By Peta Owens-Liston; Photos by Laura Seitz